Custom CRM development and CRM implementation, built around how you sell.
A CRM is only worth what people put into it, and people only put in what the CRM makes easy. We build CRMs around how your team actually wins, serves and keeps clients, or set up Salesforce, HubSpot or Dynamics 365 to do the same, and connect it to the rest of your systems. Specified before it is priced, built by our engineers.
Based in Vancouver. Discovery happens on site, wherever your team is; the build runs remotely.
What people mean by "CRM"
CRM setup, CRM implementation, a CRM consultant — the words get used for at least seven different jobs, and the right answer changes completely depending on which one you meant. This is how we tell them apart on the first call, including the cases where the thing you need is not a CRM and we will say so.
- A shared contact list
- One record per person and company, and who spoke to whom last, instead of three spreadsheets and everyone’s inbox. The smallest version of this is real and worth doing, and it does not need an enterprise platform to do it.
- A sales pipeline
- Deals, stages, probabilities and a forecast somebody trusts. This is what most CRM products are actually built for, so if it is all you need, buying one and setting it up properly is usually the cheaper answer.
- A support desk
- Tickets, queues, response targets and a history per customer. That is a service desk rather than a CRM, and the two are often sold under the same name. Which one you need depends on whether your revenue comes from winning work or from keeping it.
- Marketing and email
- Lists, campaigns, nurture sequences and attribution. This normally belongs in a marketing platform connected to the CRM, not inside it. Buying a CRM to send email usually means paying for a pipeline nobody uses.
- Quotes and orders
- Configured products, pricing rules, approvals and an order that reaches production. Past a certain complexity this is the ERP’s job, not the CRM’s, and forcing it into a CRM is a common and expensive mistake.
- Case or matter management
- Files, documents, deadlines and a defensible record. Regulated practices need audit trails, retention rules and access control that a sales CRM does not carry. That is case management, and we build it as its own thing.
- Getting off the spreadsheets
- Often the real ask. If the spreadsheets track jobs, inventory, scheduling or production rather than customers, what you need is custom operations software, and a CRM would be the wrong purchase.
Custom CRM development: what we build
- Contacts and accounts
- People, companies and the relationships between them, with one record per client instead of three spreadsheets and an inbox.
- Pipeline and quotes
- Stages that match how you actually sell, with quotes, proposals and the reasons deals are won or lost recorded where reporting can use them.
- Follow-ups and tasks
- Next steps created by the system when a stage changes, with reminders before they are due and escalation when they are missed.
- Intake
- Enquiries from web forms, email and phone captured once, de-duplicated, and routed to the right person on arrival.
- Hand-off to delivery
- When a deal closes, the job, matter or account opens in the system that delivers the work, with nothing typed twice.
- Integrations
- Your ERP, accounting, email, calendar and marketing tools connected, so the CRM is the record everyone trusts rather than one more place to update.
- CRM implementation
- Where an off-the-shelf CRM is the better fit, Salesforce, HubSpot or Dynamics 365 configured around your process, with the integrations and the data migration done properly.
- CRM data migration
- From spreadsheets or an old CRM: every field mapped, duplicates merged, and records reconciled against the source before anyone switches over.
Three ways to start
A CRM fails when it is configured before anyone agrees how the business sells. Each of these starts there.
Signs your CRM is not working
If one of these sounds familiar, it is the kind of problem we are called in for.
- The CRM is only up to date the week before the sales meeting.
- Leads arrive by email and web form, and some are never followed up.
- Each salesperson keeps their own spreadsheet because the CRM does not fit how they work.
- You pay per seat for features nobody uses, and still export to Excel to get the report you need.
- Once a deal closes, everything is typed again into the system that delivers the work.
Where this experience comes from
Our lead analyst's career history, described by sector — not an Elarion client list. More on the About page.
- Business analyst on a Dynamics 365 CRM implementation at a global retailer: end-to-end process mapping, workflow automation with conversational agents, integrations with downstream services, and user acceptance testing.
- A CRM platform migration at a public health organisation: business requirements, functional designs, integration architecture and operational dashboards.
- Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365 Fundamentals (ERP and CRM).
Questions buyers ask
- Custom CRM or Salesforce and HubSpot?
- If your process is close to how those products expect a business to sell, buy one: it is cheaper to start, and we can set it up properly. Build when the way you sell or serve is what sets you apart, when per-seat costs keep climbing, or when the CRM has to work closely with your own operations. The CRM review answers this for your business before anyone spends on either.
- Can you implement Salesforce, HubSpot or Dynamics 365?
- Yes. We configure the platform around a written specification of how you sell, connect it to your other systems and migrate your data. Where you already have a partner for licensing, we work alongside them.
- Can we see a CRM you have built?
- The CRMs we have built for clients are covered by confidentiality, so they are not published here. We are happy to talk through relevant examples on the discovery call, without naming the client.
- How do you handle CRM data migration?
- Every field from the spreadsheets or the old CRM is mapped, duplicates are merged, and the records are reconciled against the source. Your team checks a trial migration before the real one.
- Who owns a custom CRM?
- You do. It is built in your accounts, and the code, the data and the documentation are yours, with no per-seat licence.
- How is it priced?
- As a fixed price against a written specification. If the process is not yet clear, the CRM review comes first as a fixed-fee piece of work.
- Is CRM setup the same thing as CRM implementation?
- People use both for the same job, and we treat them as the same job: deciding how you sell, then configuring or building the system to match. Where they differ in practice is depth. A CRM setup is often taken to mean getting a platform switched on and the data loaded; a CRM implementation is usually understood to include the process work, the integrations and the migration. We always do the process work first, whichever word you used, because configuring a CRM before anyone agrees how the business sells is the single most common way these projects fail.
- Do you work with businesses outside Vancouver, in Burnaby, Langley and the Fraser Valley?
- Yes, and on site. Burnaby is about twenty minutes from our downtown office and Langley is a drive up the valley, so discovery happens at your premises rather than over a call. We work across Metro Vancouver and British Columbia, and with clients elsewhere in Canada and the United States.
Further reading
- Off-the-shelf or custom software? How to decideThe default should be to buy.
- Replacing spreadsheets with software, without losing what worksThe spreadsheet running your operation is not the problem.
Related services
A CRM nobody updates?
30 minutes, free. Bring the problem, or the change you already have in mind.